Chương 133: Chapter 116 (B2-ch10) – A Leg to Stand On

"Are you sure?" Cade asked, holding Kyle's gaze.

"I've never done this before. It might be painful. Hell, it might not even work." Kyle gave a short, humorless laugh.

"I can take it. There's nothing you can do to me that'll hurt worse than what I've been through." Cade studied him for another second, then sighed.

"Alright. Let's try something." He glanced around. Amanda stared at him with an intense focus, like she was afraid to blink and miss something. Professor Sanders had drifted closer during the conversation, his posture stiff and his eyes gleamed with curiosity. Several other survivors watched from near the fire. It's fine. Not like they didn't just witness me grow huts and a perimeter wall. He let the thought settle, then pushed them all away. Cade activated [Hyperfocused Meditation]. The world narrowed.

The crackling fire faded into the background. The weight of everyone's attention disappeared with it, and the rest of the camp fell away until there was only Cade, Kyle, and the damaged stump of Kyle's leg. Cade focused through [Essence Sight], bringing Kyle's channels into view. Green life essence pulsed through his body, weaker around the missing limb but still present.

Blue Mana and orange Stamina threaded outward from the silver sphere of his System Core, moving through pathways that ran down his torso, through his hips, and into what remained of his leg. Cade followed those channels upward, tracing their origin and flow, then slowly worked his way back down. Everything looked mostly intact until he reached the stump. There, the channels were a mess. Some had pinched shut, creating unnatural blockages. Others were torn at the edges like frayed yarn.

A few twisted back into themselves, forcing Mana and Stamina to loop through damaged pathways instead of flowing cleanly through the limb. Cade studied where they narrowed. Where they broke. Where Kyle's body had closed itself off around the missing limb, doing just enough to keep him alive but not enough to fully regenerate. As he watched, Cade reached forward and began unraveling the bandages. Kyle sucked in a breath but didn't pull away. Layer by layer, the wrappings came loose.

The flesh was mostly healed, though ugly and uneven, the skin pulled tight around the stump where Amanda's magic and Kyle's own life essence had done what they could. It was not enough. Not for what Kyle needed. Cade rested his hand near the exposed flesh and let his focus sharpen even further. The obvious answer was [Prismatic Conduit]. If he could use the transformative aspect of his lightning to reforge Kyle's body like he had his own, then maybe he could force the archer's flesh to grow the missing limb back.

It was the closest thing Cade had to healing magic. But how much essence would that take? His own Core felt vast, almost inexhaustible when he reached for it, but that didn't mean it had no limits. More importantly, Kyle wasn't Cade. Cade had survived his own transformation because of his Willpower, his circumstances, and his refusal to let his body be destroyed. He didn't know Kyle well enough to assume the same. Cade flicked his attention toward the archer and used [Greater Identify].

Kyle Thorne — Level 15 Race: Human (F-rank) Highest Attribute: Dexterity: 53 He dismissed the information a moment later. Maybe [Prismatic Conduit] could work, but Kyle might not survive it, and Cade had no interest in testing the limits of another person's body by attempting to mimic what he had done. He considered another option. He could try binding his Law Seed of Renewal to [Prismatic Conduit], the way he had bound his Law Seed of Dissolution to [Mantle of Dissolution]. He knew the connection was possible.

He had felt it before when he was still within Cynthia's Legacy. The problem was that he still didn't fully understand the effects of binding a Law Seed to a skill. Would [Prismatic Conduit] become purely restorative? Would it lose the flexibility that made it so useful? Cade liked that his lightning could damage or transform, depending on his intent. Binding Renewal to it might give him exactly what he needed here, but it might also lead the skill down a path he wasn't sure he wanted it to take.

After a moment of deliberation he slowly shook his head. Sure, Kyle needed help, but Cade didn't want to limit himself in the process. Which left the rhizome. Kyle had asked for anything that Cade could do. But a wooden prosthetic grown from the rhizome and strapped to his stump wouldn't be enough. Not to survive in this Tutorial. Kyle was missing his knee and ankle joints. He needed something that would bend when he wanted it to bend.

Something he could balance on, push off of, and use without thinking through every step. He needed to stand, run, jump, and reposition in a fight. For that, the replacement couldn't be dead wood. It had to be alive. And if it was alive, it needed a way to gain resources and respond to Kyle's command. For the rhizome to work as a proper prosthetic, he would need to connect it to Kyle's channels. Cade pictured the roots sinking into the stump in thin, careful threads.

He imagined them finding Kyle's arteries, veins, and channels and anchoring onto them. Life essence to keep the rhizome alive. Stamina to make it move when Kyle moved. Mana to give the limb access to whatever deeper functions Kyle's Class and skills might require. When that picture was clear in his mind, he imagined the rhizome growing outward into a functional leg.

A living structure shaped around Kyle's remaining limb as a template, with braided roots where muscle should be, flexible knots where joints needed to bend, and tough layered wood along the sole to take his weight. Something that could flex, balance, and respond. Something Kyle could use without thinking about every motion. Cade pressed his palm flat against the mostly healed stump. He felt the archer tense under his hand, but Kyle didn't pull away.

Cade pushed his will into the rhizome and gave it a simple command. Grow. Pale roots slid from Cade's palm and into Kyle's flesh. Kyle sucked in a harsh breath. His fingers dug into the arms of the wooden chair, but he stayed still. Cade watched through [Essence Sight] as the rhizome burrowed through the healed tissue. He carefully guided every strand, every branching thread, using Kyle's own channels as a map.

First, the rhizome found the pulsing green life essence in the stump and latched on at several points, each connection allowing more life essence to flow into the rhizome. Then Cade pushed deeper. The rhizome followed tattered pathways upward through Kyle's leg, thin roots weaving through flesh until they reached the healthy channels connected to his hip. A sound rose somewhere in the background, but [Hyperfocused Meditation] quickly filtered it out.

"Hold still," Cade muttered as Kyle's body jolted. Cade pushed more of his will into the rhizome and guided it toward Kyle's healthy Stamina channels. The roots writhed, finding the orange pathways one by one before wrapping around them and forcing each connection to hold. Only after the Stamina channels held did Cade turn his attention toward the blue threads of Mana. Then he paused. Life essence and Stamina made sense as they moved through the physical body, carrying energy and vitality downward.

They were rooted in flesh, muscle, and blood. Mana was different. It was there, threaded through Kyle's body in channels, but it was tied to the metaphysical. How could he force physical roots to connect to the metaphysical? This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version. He had no idea. When the rhizome had entered his own body, it had done the work of integrating itself on its own. He hadn't guided it or made the connections himself.

He pushed his will into the rhizome anyway, willing it to connect to Kyle's Mana channels. But for the first time, the rhizome did not obey his command. Cade's focus sharpened and he tried again, more carefully this time, guiding the roots toward the nearest blue thread, easing them closer instead of forcing the connection outright. But still the roots would not connect. The impression he got from it wasn't refusal or disobedience. It felt more like asking a hand to grasp smoke.

The rhizome understood what he wanted, but it couldn't find anything solid enough to graft onto. The Mana channel was there, visible through [Essence Sight], but to the rhizome, it might as well not have existed. Cade held there for a moment, trying to find another way. He shifted his focus along the edge of Kyle's Mana channels, searching for some point of contact, some place where the rhizome could anchor itself, but nothing worked.

Every attempt slid off as if the channel had no substance the rhizome could recognize. Why? The rhizome had connected to his own physical and metaphysical channels. It had burrowed through Cade's body and intertwined itself with him as if it belonged there, linking to things he barely understood. But Cade's body wasn't normal anymore. He had gone through the Ashen Baptism, tempered himself with the Ash–Tempest Confluence, and then reforged his body with the Stormsap Crucible. Maybe that was the difference.

Maybe the rhizome could connect to him completely because his body had already been broken down, rebuilt, and altered into something that could accept it. Kyle hadn't gone through any of that. After a few more seconds, Cade forced himself to stop. This would have to be enough. The rhizome had connected to Kyle's life essence and Stamina. It could feed, move, and respond to the physical parts of him. It wasn't perfect, but it would give Kyle what he needed to survive for now.

Even without a connection to Kyle's Mana channels, Cade was still linked to him through the rhizome. He could feel the faint pressure of Kyle's life essence and Stamina through the roots. He could also feel something else. Resistance. It came from Kyle's body, subtle but steadily growing as the rhizome drew from his resources. The damaged flesh tightened around the rhizome in what Cade now recognized as rejection. Kyle's body did not understand that the roots were there to help.

It saw them as an invader that did not belong. If Cade left it like this, the graft might fail before Kyle ever got the chance to stand on it. The limb might grow, but that didn't mean his body would keep it. Like an organ transplant from a donor that didn't match, Kyle's body could still reject the rhizome. Cade couldn't let that happen. He reached within for his Law Seed of Renewal. What has broken down may rise anew. Kyle's flesh had been broken down. Not by choice or through refinement, but broken all the same.

The leg that had been there was gone, and his body had sealed itself around the loss. But Renewal wasn't only about restoring what had been. It also meant adapting to what came next. The rhizome was not Kyle's old leg, but it could become something his body recognized. Something grown to answer the absence of flesh. A new structure for his life essence and Stamina to feed. A new limb for his will to move. A new leg to stand on. Cade pushed that intent through the rhizome and into Kyle's damaged flesh. Accept this.

Bind to it. Make it part of you. The Law Seed of Renewal pulsed as a faint thread of power flowed with his essence through the roots, settling at every point where wood met flesh and channels intertwined. Cade didn't force Kyle's body to heal around the graft. He pushed deeper than that, using Renewal to overwrite the rejection itself. The rhizome was not an invader. It was not a parasite. It was a replacement grown from loss, and Kyle's body needed to accept it as part of what came next.

The resistance eased as Cade's Law took hold within Kyle's body. At the same time, something shifted within his Law Seed. It was subtle, barely detectable, but Cade couldn't spare the attention to investigate. His work wasn't done. Cade fed more essence into the rhizome and shifted his intent. Now that the foundation had been laid, it was time to build. The exposed stump twitched and flesh roiled as the rhizome began to grow. Pale roots spilled from the end of Kyle's leg as Cade pulled his hand back.

Wood twisted downward in tight braided strands as he held the image of Kyle's remaining leg in his mind and forced the growth to mirror it. The roots lengthened, building the rough outline from the stump of Kyle's thigh down to a knee, then a calf, and an ankle. Thicker strands wound together like muscle, flexing as they settled into place. Darker bands formed beneath the surface, tough and springy where tendons should be.

Thin channels threaded through the structure, carrying faint pulses of green and orange from Kyle's body into the growing limb. The foot came last. Roots split and flattened, shaping into an arch, a heel, and toes that curled before relaxing. The surface smoothed into layered brown bark, flexible at the joints and tougher along the sole. Fine seams marked where the ankle, knee, and toes would bend. Prismatic sparks crawled over the living wood in brief flashes, then sank into the wood and vanished.

Cade slowly pulled his hand back as the limb finished growing. The new leg rested beside Kyle's remaining one, similar in shape and length, but unmistakably not made of human tissue. Cade held the connection for one more second, checking the channels. Life essence and Stamina moved through the limb, mirroring the flow in Kyle's other leg. It wasn't perfect, but it would suffice for now. He wasn't exactly satisfied with the result, but it was better than nothing.

Cade willed the rhizome within him to sever its link to the grown limb. The connection snapped cleanly, leaving the living prosthetic bound to Kyle instead of Cade. Cade held his breath for a moment and examined every inch of it through [Essence Sight]. When nothing went wrong and he saw no sign of Kyle's body rejecting the graft, he took a step back and released [Hyperfocused Meditation]. The world returned all at once. The first thing he noticed was that day had faded to night.

The only light came from the crackling fire behind him. In his periphery, Amanda and Professor Sanders stood too close on either side of him. Cade let his eyes linger on the limb for a moment longer, then looked at Kyle's face. To say the man looked rough would have been an understatement. He was barely conscious. Tears still streamed down his cheeks, and his eyes had gone glassy as he stared off into the distance without blinking.

His hands had gone slack against the arms of the chair, and his breathing came in shallow, uneven rasps. Amanda was the first to speak, her voice trembling.

"That had to have been torture." Cade's mouth tightened.

"He screamed nearly the entire time," Amanda said quietly.

"We had to restrain Bryan from pulling you off of Kyle." Cade grimaced and looked back at the barely conscious archer. He had known it might hurt. He had warned Kyle, but there was a wide gap between a bit of pain and enough to make Kyle scream until his eyes went glassy. Amanda glanced up at Cade.

"He never told you to stop. Not once," she said.

"Even through all of that, he never said to stop." That helped, but not enough to make Cade feel good about what he had just put the man through. Kyle had known the risk. He had made the choice. Still, Cade could do a bit more for the archer. He reached into his pocket and pulled out the Primordial Bead Dewdrop. Thankfully, Earl had been thoughtful enough to buy him sweatpants with pockets this time. He pressed the small teardrop-shaped bead against Kyle's chest and activated it.

Rejuvenating energy rushed out of the Dewdrop and into Kyle's body. Cade watched through [Essence Sight] as the restorative pulse flooded through his channels. Some of the lingering wounds on Kyle's chest eased as torn flesh pulled back together. It didn't fix everything, but it did enough. Kyle sucked in a sharp breath, blinked rapidly, and looked down. His gaze locked onto the new limb, and for a moment, everyone remained silent. Kyle stared at the leg Cade had grown for him.

His expression shifted slowly, confusion giving way to disbelief. He raised his head and looked at Cade. His eyes filled with tears again.

"Cade, I—""Well," Cade said, cutting him off "before you say anything, let's see if it worked." Kyle's mouth closed and Cade offered him a hand.

"Try standing." Cade braced him as the archer shakily pulled himself out of the chair. Kyle's real leg trembled, and the wooden one shifted awkwardly beneath him. His fingers tightened around Cade's hand hard enough that it might have hurt a normal person. Then the living prosthetic adjusted to its host. The knee joint bent, the ankle stabilized as the foot flattened, and each individual toe flexed against the ground. Kyle froze, then took one careful step.

The movement was uneven and stiff, but the leg moved with him. It bent where it needed to bend, caught his weight when he leaned into it, and adjusted when he shifted his balance. After a few more steps, Kyle let go of Cade's hand. Amanda made a small sound, one hand rising to cover her mouth. Kyle took a few more steps on his own. A sound escaped him, half sob and half laugh. He turned back toward Cade, there was no mistaking it. Kyle was laughing as fresh tears rolled down his face.

"It works," Kyle said.

"Holy shit. It works." He looked at Cade, smiling through tears.

"Thank you. It's better than I could have hoped. I was expecting a peg leg or a chunk of wood or something. But this… this actually moves like it's mine." He shifted his weight and lifted the prosthetic. The wooden toes curled, then stretched out.

"I can feel that," Kyle said, voice cracking.

"All the way down to the toes. I can actually feel it." Cade let out a breath he hadn't realized he was holding.

"I did the best I could," Cade said.

"But there was a problem." Kyle looked up quickly. Cade nodded toward the leg.

"I connected it to your life…uh…health and Stamina channels. That should let it feed, move, and respond to you. But your Mana channels wouldn't bind to the wood. I don't know why. So if you have any skills or magic that requires you to move Mana into your foot, they probably won't work through that leg." Kyle stared at him for a second before he laughed again.

"That's fine," he said.

"I don't have any of those. I only use Mana to empower my arrows." Cade blinked.

"Well, that's good. But in the future you'll need to steer clear of any skills that require Mana to flow to both legs."

"It's been weeks since I've walked on my own feet," Kyle said.

"I think I can live with that limitation if it means having my independence back." Cade glanced over and found Amanda and Professor Sanders staring at him. Amanda looked like her entire understanding of healing magic had just been balled up and thrown in the trash. Professor Sanders looked much the same, disbelief clear on both their faces. Amanda swallowed hard.

"How… how did you do that?"